


Nevermind...

by FionaGlenanneWesten



Category: Burn Notice
Genre: 1930s AU, AU, Dust Bowl, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Kid Fic (but only sort of), Slow Burn, song au, song prompt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-02
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2020-07-29 10:34:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20080750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FionaGlenanneWesten/pseuds/FionaGlenanneWesten
Summary: Burn Notice au based off the songNevermindby Nanci Griffith—re-Harland Howard.Slow burn love story, 1931 dust bowl/fruit pickers AU.I had to finagle it a little bit to make it work (Charlotte is Fi's niece, not Michael's for example, in the original song, it's a daughter, not a niece). As always, I've made Charlie a trans little girl, not a boy.





	1. First saw you picking oranges in Orlando...

Fiona moved her ladder towards a tree heavily laden with fairly high-up fruit, knowing it was relatively dangerous and nobody else would want that tree and she was one of the lightest workers there, and therefor, least likely to snap the branches and die picking it.

As she pulled back from her ladder, she noticed a new worker she’d never seen before around her age with a lazy smile and dazzling prussian blue eyes.

He noticed her looking at him, caught her eye, flashed her a crooked smile, and nodded at her.

Fiona smiled and blushed back at him briefly before looking away.

“Hey, Katie, who’s the new guy?”

Fiona nodded her head, amused, at the handsome stranger.

The brown haired girl accessed the new worker.

“I don’t know, actually...Never seen him before,” she said.

He interrupted their conversation by walking over to them.

“Hey,” he said.

He nodded briefly to acknowledge Katie in a friendly way, but then immediately returned his attention to Fiona.

“M'name’s Michael...”

There was that smile again.

He offered his hand to her.

“And you are?”

She took his outstretched fingers briefly.

“Fiona,” she said softly.

Michael put his ladder in the equally spindly tree next to the one Fiona had picked.

“That is not a good idea,” Fiona said, darting her eyes up and down his frame, sizing him up.

He gave her a quizicle look.

“What are you, like 170lbs?..."

He swallowed nervously, suddenly turned into a sweaty palmed school-boy under her gaze, though he was doing his best to hide it. 

"Thereabouts," he said.

"You’ll die,” she said. "That tree can't handle that much weight."

He pouted, but reluctantly moved his ladder one tree down, but he gave her sad puppy-dog eyes he did it.

"So who's gonna do it?" he said, climbing his ladder.

"I'll probably do it later," Fiona said.

"If it's not safe..." he started.

"I'm one of the lightest ones here. I always do the dangerous trees. I'll be fine," she dismissed. 

"Then I'll try to stay by the light trees," he said, that lazy grin back on his face.

Fiona smiled and brushed the hair off her face. 

“Oh you’ve got it bad,” Katie teased once he had turned away.

Fi hid her smile and fake punched Katie in the arm before running off to the fruit trees.


	2. And all day you kept your ladder close to mine...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More changes to make this story make sense.  
Fi's now from Lubbock, where Nanci Griffith's from cuz having a dustbowl refugee from Dublin, Ireland makes zero sense.
> 
> Also, I've recently been informed there aren't hills in Florida. Please forgive me. I'm not deleting my chapter.
> 
> Also, enjoy the person shift, I can't write 3rd.

"So..." the new boy said, moving his ladder to the nearest tree sturdy enough to bear his weight near the one I had picked for the forth time today. "Where you from?"

"Lubbock, Texas," I answered. "You?"

"Miami," he answered.

"So only a little south of here?" I asked.

"Yeah," he answered.

"We're dustbowl refugees," I said. "What prompts a boy from Miami from become a fruit-picker?"

"I was from a poor family anyway, abusive dad—left home when I was 17, and took whatever work I could get," Michael said. "The first truck I hitched a ride on out of Miami was a fruit truck, the money was decent and I haven't looked back since."

When we were finally released form the orange groves for dinner, I looked for him to ask him if he wanted to come with us down to have dinner, but he'd vanished. I looked for him as everyone gathered for dinner at camp too, but he was nowhere to be found.

I awoke to a sound of someone outside my tent. There was rustling outside and the corner of the tent flap pulled back.

"Psssst," came the hoarse whisper from outside the tent. "Fiona?"

I climbed off my pallet and crept to the door.

"Yeah?" I asked, pulling the tent flap back the rest of the way to recognise the boy from earlier.

"Michael," I said, smiling, not a little amused to see him.

"The tall, blond boy a few tents over said this was your tent," he whispered.

I nodded and smiled.

"Come with me," he said.

"Sure, just one second," I replied.

I ducked back inside the tent and crept over to Katie's pallet and nudged her awake.

"Katie," I whispered, poking her. 

Katie made a sleepy sound and rolled over.

"Yeah...?" she asked.

"Can you watched Charlotte?" I asked. "I have to go outside for a second."

"Sure," she said, rolling over and going back to sleep. I glanced at my niece, asleep on her tiny pallet, by the door where it was less hot. At this hour, Katie wouldn't do much more than sleep next to Charlotte, but I had to make sure Katie at least knew I would be gone so someone could take charge of my niece in case something happened.

I slipped outside, not bothering to change out of my cotton nightshift in the night heat.

"I'm here," I said, ducking out.

He grasped my hand and took off through the camp almost at a run.

"Where are we going?" I gasped, nearly tripping over tree roots and camp items scattered around the camp before I got my feet under me.

Michael didn't say anything and I just chased him, up a hill, through the orange groves in the moonlight, my feet pressing in the soft, dusty earth—If' I'd known we were going this far, I'd have brought shoes... 

Eventually we came to a clearing at the top a hill where a rusted old truck that had lost most of it's interior sat decaying on a hill, and the soft, almost salt grass crushed under our toes. A few late evening fireflies blinked at the edge of the clearing and Florida was so flat, from the top this hill, we could see the lights of Orlando and the coast stretching all the way down to the sea.

Michael threw himself down onto the ground and grabbed my hand and pulled me down onto the grass next to him. It was pretty dark out here in the middle of nothing and we could all the stars canopying the night sky.

"How did you find this place?" I asked him.

"Rambling," he said. "I do it a lot."

"Me too," I said. "More before my sister died."

He rolled over on his side and looked at me.

"I was the oldest, but I was always flighty, irresponsible one..." I said.

He pulled a chocolate orange out of his pocket and offered me a piece.

"Where did you get this?" I asked.

"I have my ways," he said mysteriously, though I knew that that meant he either spent his hard earned money on it or he stole it, neither of which I held again him.


End file.
